States of vaxing populous up bihar bengal must buck up

States of vaxing populous up bihar bengal must buck up

India’s fast-rising vax numbers – including an impressive 2 crore-plus doses on Friday – indicate some states reaching their target of vaccinating all adults much before others. The leaders: Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Uttarakhand and Gujarat have fully vaccinated over 30% and partially vaccinated at least 80% of adults. Others like Delhi, Jammu & Kashmir, Karnataka, Rajasthan and Haryana have crossed the 70% mark for partial vaccination and range between 24-30% in double-dosing adults. But far more populous states like UP, Bihar, Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra are lagging.

Yes, in total doses administered, UP, Maharashtra and MP are frontrunners. But such are their population numbers, they don’t have the luxury of complacency. UP and Bihar have single-dosed over 50% of adults but delivered second doses to just 10-12%. UP has single-dosed 7.6 crore people against 2.35 crore by Kerala. But UP still has another 7 crore residents to mop up for the first dose while Kerala has only 30 lakh recipients to find. UP has managed just over 1.6 crore second doses, signalling a long slog on that count too.

China, which claims to have fully vaccinated 100 crore persons, sent vaccinators to farms rather than await rural folk at vaxing facilities. Some Indian civic bodies have attempted door-to-door vaccination and mobile vaccination vans. To reach the poorest of rural poor and urban migrants – those who cannot skip a workday or without means to travel to vaccination sites – finding them at doorsteps or workplaces may be the only viable option. Reaching outlier adults may be trickier than mass vaxing children whose turn comes next. Children can at least be found through schools and anganwadis or using the national immunisation programme template. But India’s vast informal economy requires unorthodox solutions.